Leveraging Digital Asset Management (DAM) in a Finnish retail corporation : A case study on the current state and future vision of Kesko Corporations’ marketing and content production.

Abstract

This case study analyses how rich media content (digital assets) is created, stored, shared and managed at a Finnish retail company – Kesko Corporation. The study aims to identify the benefits and possible disadvantages of centralizing management and production of these digital assets into a Digital Asset Management (DAM) system. My main research question is: Are there achievable content enhancements that the introduction of a centralized DAM system might bring to Kesko Corporation's marketing operations? I have chosen to conduct a case study. I have studied Kesko Corporation with its different trade divisions. I decided to remove the K-retailer field of independent retailers since they are not using digital assets in the same manner as the chain units. This allows me to focus more specifically on affected parties within the group. The study relies on a qualitative method. Data was collected through semi-structured interviews with management in the digital development- and marketing departments at Kesko, and a survey on how digital asset management currently is executed in the different business units. The survey was sent to all of the operative marketing staff at Kesko Corporation. This research demonstrates that the lack of a central asset repository, and metadata enriched assets, in part creates heavy and manual operations, which frustrate marketers. It also seems to prohibit Kesko from fully utilizing automated marketing operations. Kesko’s vision of a customer centric marketing seems clear, but the challenges they face, lie in building the foundation for such activities. While DAM cannot resolve this problem alone, it most certainly is seen to be one key enabler for achieving these strategic visions.